Smirky= 'a little bit heartless' (Medicare Drug Plan)

[deminks]

Bush Prescribes Family Help on Drug Plan

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/03/15/AR2006031501575.html?nav=rss_politics

Faced with a persistent questioner who asked him what could be done to help her elderly mother understand Medicare's new prescription drug plan, President Bush offered a suggestion that at first elicited shocked gasps, and then supportive applause, from an audience of retirees in Silver Spring yesterday.

"Look, I'm not going to tell you your business, but I think it's your responsibility to help your mom," Bush told Wendy Meyeroff. She had asked him to consider extending the May 15 deadline for registering for the new benefit without a penalty, but Bush refused.

Maryland Democrats used Bush's presence as an opportunity to attack the plan. "Unfortunately, this prescription drug program is helping America's seniors the way the federal government helped the victims of Hurricane Katrina," Rep. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.) said at a rally in Silver Spring sponsored by an advocacy group.

Audience member Alan Mayers, a retired federal worker, said Bush's answer didn't account for seniors who don't have help from a child. "I think that was a little bit heartless, but consistent with the general approach of the administration toward safety nets," he said.

[xxqqqzme]

1. I like the Katrina comparison

that's a good one

[EFerrari]

3. It is the comparison and can be used for all his "social" plans.

Just like he helped us out on 9/11.

[Fridays Child]

2. Fuck B*sh and the horse he rode in on.

Arrogant cocksucker. :mad:

[EFerrari]

4. That would be, borrowed rented pick up.

:)

[Fridays Child]

5. Oh, yeah. Horses scare the little dickwad.

Hardly surprising. Horses are extremely intelligent and superb judges of character. :nuke:

[Trevelyan]

6. The funny thing is that they are telling young people

that they will be impoverished by supporting their aging parents in their retirement. Bush's plan will put even more of the burden of supporting aging parents on individual children -- by putting pressure on kids to support their parents in their old age and by requiring the parents to spend down all their savings as they age and thus reducing and often eliminating any hope of an inheritance for today's young people.

The only winners in Bush's pension, Social Security, retirement and elderly policies are the wealthy who can live off their investments at virtually any age and successful owners of profitable business (the bigger the business the bigger the gain for the owners) whose pension and Social Security contributions and obligations the Bush administration is trying to reduce. The losers are the members of the younger generation who will be saddled with guilt if they don't provide for their parents and with a huge financial burden if they do provide.

A good solution: let's make it possible for seniors to work longer by enforcing decent work conditions and hours for people of all generations and severely punishing age discrimination in the workplace. How about damages of five times the actual wages lost for age discrimination plus attorney's fees for the worker who is discriminated against?

How about shifting the heaviest burden of proof to the employer to prove it terminated or did not hire the older worker based on age rather than imposing that burden on the employee.

[EFerrari]

7. This may be going to left field, but I notice this is just one more way

they undermine the family. The place where most of us draw strength from.

Family values, my remote. The Republican agenda does everything possible to pit one generation against the other. The slogan is in reality an opposite descriptor, like all their slogans.